About Xplorer Prize

Xplorer Prize

The Xplorer Prize, also known in English as the Science Exploration Award or Science Exploration Prize, is one of China's highest-funded philanthropic awards for young scientists. It was established in 2018 and jointly initiated by Tencent founder Ma Huateng, known as Pony Ma, with 14 renowned scientists including Nobel laureate Yang Chen-Ning, Rao Yi, Shi Yigong, Pan Jianwei and Shing-Tung Yau. The prize supports full-time science and technology professionals aged 45 or under working in the Chinese mainland, Hong Kong and Macao, across ten fields of basic science and frontier technology: mathematics and physics, life sciences, astronomy and geoscience, chemistry and new materials, information and electronics, energy and environment, advanced manufacturing, transport and construction, frontier interdisciplinary research and, from 2022, medical sciences. Each year up to 50 winners receive 3 million renminbi each over five years, 600,000 renminbi per year, originally provided by the Tencent Foundation and now funded by the New Cornerstone Science Foundation, under a scientist-led, non-governmental governance model designed to give recipients freedom in how the money is used. The first 50 winners, selected from more than 1,300 entries across 26 institutions, were presented in Beijing on 2 November 2019. The prize had supported 200 scientists by 2022, 347 by its seventh edition in 2025 and 397 by its eighth edition announced in August 2026.

Founding in 2018 by Ma Huateng and Fourteen Scientists

The Xplorer Prize was established in 2018, on the occasion of Tencent's 20th anniversary, and jointly initiated by Ma Huateng, chairman and chief executive of Tencent and founder of the Tencent Foundation, together with 14 renowned scientists. The initiating scientists named across the prize's official accounts include Nobel laureate in physics Yang Chen-Ning, also rendered Chen Ning Yang, Rao Yi of Peking University, Shi Yigong, Pan Jianwei, Shing-Tung Yau, Mao Shude, He Huawu, Wu Hequan, Li Peigen, Chen Shiyi, Zhang Yitang, Gao Wen, Xie Kechang, Cheng Taining and Xie Xiaoliang, with Rao Yi working alongside Ma in bringing the prize into being. The initial funding was provided by the Tencent Foundation, the first charitable foundation established by an internet group in China, with a sum of one billion renminbi put aside for the award. The founding idea, expressed by the initiators at the first ceremony, was that young talent determines the future of science and that young researchers in basic science needed sustained, flexible support at the stage of their careers when they are most productive and least securely funded. Tencent co-founder Chen Yidan, founder and honorary president of the Tencent Charity Foundation, articulated the philosophy at the 2019 ceremony: science without borders is the most inclusive driving force, and it is young talent who determine the future of science.

Design: Scientist-Led, Non-Governmental and Unrestricted

The Xplorer Prize is designed as a non-governmental, public-interest and scientist-led award, a structure its organisers emphasise in every account. It is an unofficial, non-profit prize in which scientists, rather than the funding company, govern the selection and the rules, with the stated aim of encouraging recipients to devote themselves fully to the exploration of unknown areas and to fundamental science and frontier technology. Each winner receives a total of 3 million renminbi over five years, originally provided by the Tencent Foundation, and the funding is famously without strings: reports of the prize stress that there are no strings attached, so that recipients may use the money flexibly for their research and lives rather than against narrow project deliverables. The prize is open to full-time science and technology professionals aged 45 and below working in the Chinese mainland, and in its mature form also in Hong Kong and Macao. In its sixth edition, the management committee, whose members include academician Yan Ning, extended additional support to female researchers by raising the age limit for female applicants from 45 to 48 years, an adjustment reported as contributing to a significant increase in female recipients that year. The evaluation is conducted by a large jury: the first edition's 1,335 applications were evaluated by a jury of 350 people over a process of about four months.

The Ten Fields

The prize covers ten fields of basic science and frontier technology, organised in its early form under two main categories, fundamental sciences and frontier technologies. The fundamental sciences include mathematics and physics, life sciences, astronomy and geoscience, and chemistry and new materials. The frontier technology and applied fields include information and electronics, energy and environment, advanced manufacturing, and transport and construction, together with frontier interdisciplinary research. In 2022 the field of medical sciences was newly included as the tenth category, and five clinical researchers were honoured in that first medical cohort. The breadth of the fields is visible in the research of recent winners: the 2025 cohort's work covered visual restoration using artificial retinal photostimulation, generation and manipulation of non-Abelian anyons, drug development for sensorineural hearing loss, carbon dioxide conversion applications in manned closed environments, and planetary mobile exploration robots. The ten-field structure, spanning the purest mathematics to clinical medicine and space robotics, positions the prize as a general endowment of young Chinese science rather than a disciplinary award, and its interdisciplinary category explicitly rewards work that falls between established fields.

The First Winners in 2019

The first Xplorer Prize award ceremony was held in Beijing on 2 November 2019, hosted by Tencent. Fifty winners were selected from over 1,300 entries, 1,335 applications in the fuller count, represented by 26 organisations across China, including research institutions, universities and an enterprise. Nine of the 50 winners were under the age of 35, reflecting the prize's stated wish to cultivate younger researchers in basic science. Apart from a trophy received at the ceremony, each winner was awarded a total of 3 million renminbi over the next five years by the Tencent Foundation. Yang Chen-Ning addressed the ceremony as an initiator, and Chen Yidan spoke on the future of science resting with the young. The first cohort's composition illustrated the prize's range: members of the Biophysical Society of China among the winners included Liu Yin, Song Baoliang and Wang Hongwei in life sciences, Chen Peng recognised for new chemical materials, and Li Dong honoured for frontier cross-disciplinary sciences. Tianjin University's Gong Jinlong was among the first winners recognised in energy-related catalysis research. The first edition established the template that later editions followed: an annual cohort of up to 50, announced after months of jury evaluation and celebrated at a national ceremony.

Growth: From 50 Winners to 397 Scientists

The prize's cumulative record documents steady growth. The first edition in 2019 supported 50 scientists. By 2022 the prize had funded 200 promising young scientists, according to the organisers. The sixth edition, announced in 2024, brought the total to 297 young scientists over six years, with that year's recipients hailing from 28 institutions across 13 cities, including Hong Kong. The seventh edition in 2025 brought the total to 347 scientists since the launch in 2019; its 50 awardees came from 33 organisations in 15 mainland cities, included 13 young scientists of whom six were 35 or younger, and included nine women, accounting for 18 percent of the cohort, with the award ceremony held in Shenzhen on 20 September 2025. The eighth edition, announced on 24 August 2026, honoured 50 young scientists including eight from Peking University, bringing the cumulative total to 397 outstanding young scientists, among them 53 Peking University scholars across the prize's history. The eighth cohort included Xie Junyi of the Beijing International Center for Mathematical Research, who works on arithmetic dynamics and Diophantine geometry. The arithmetic of the prize, up to 50 winners a year at 3 million renminbi each, makes it one of the largest sustained private commitments to individual young researchers in Chinese science.

Widening Geography: Hong Kong, Macao and the Youngest Winners

Although the prize began with mainland-based scientists, its geography widened as it matured. The 2022 edition is the landmark: it newly included medical sciences, honoured Wang Guangyu in information and electronics technologies as the first prize winner born in the 1990s, for work translating artificial intelligence technology into medical treatment, and recorded the prize's first awardee from Macao, semiconductor scientist Mai Peiran, also rendered Pui In Mak, alongside Hong Kong materials scientists Yin Xiaobo and Fan Zhiyong, awarded for contributions to advanced interdisciplinary studies. The 2022 cohort of 50 winners was unveiled on 15 September 2022, with the youngest awardee born in the 1990s, and each winner awarded 3 million renminbi over five years. Later editions continued the pattern of geographic breadth, with the sixth edition's recipients drawn from 28 institutions across 13 cities including Hong Kong, and Shenzhen's own winners in that edition including Lu Haizhou and Tan Bin of the Southern University of Science and Technology and Yan Jianbin of the Agricultural Genomics Institute at Shenzhen. The inclusion of Hong Kong and Macao researchers under the same terms as mainland colleagues makes the prize one of the few major Chinese science awards operating across all three jurisdictions.

Funding: From the Tencent Foundation to New Cornerstone

The prize's funding has passed through two foundations, both created by Tencent. Initial funding was provided by the Tencent Foundation, with one billion renminbi put aside for the award at its founding in 2018. In August 2022, the New Cornerstone Science Foundation, founded by Tencent, was registered in Shenzhen, and the Xplorer Prize became one of the foundation's major initiatives; recent editions are announced by the New Cornerstone Science Foundation and each winner's 3 million renminbi is described as funded by the new foundation within five years. The transfer matters to the prize's governance story: what began as a corporate foundation's programme became the flagship of a dedicated science foundation, reinforcing the scientist-led, non-governmental character the organisers claim. The prize's management committee, including figures such as Yan Ning, oversees its rules, including the 2024 adjustment raising the age limit for female applicants. Across both funding homes, the essential terms have not changed: annual cohorts of up to 50, 3 million renminbi per winner over five years, and freedom for recipients in the use of the money.

Women, Youth and the Prize's Social Aims

Two social aims recur in the prize's public record: youth and the position of women in science. On youth, the prize is explicitly designed to favour the young within its under-45 eligibility: nine of the first 50 winners were below 35, the 2022 cohort included the first winner born in the 1990s, and the 2025 cohort included 13 young scientists of whom six were 35 or younger. On gender, the record shows deliberate corrective action: in the sixth edition in 2024, the management committee raised the age limit for female applicants from 45 to 48 years, additional support that Yan Ning announced and that was followed by a significant increase in female recipients, with seven women among that year's winners compared with just three the year before; in 2025 the number of female scientists rose further, with nine women awarded, 18 percent of the cohort. These features distinguish the prize from purely merit-historical honours: it is an intervention in the career structure of Chinese science, aimed at the years when researchers, and especially women researchers, face the sharpest combination of funding competition and family pressure. The age-limit adjustment for women is, in the public record of Chinese science prizes, a distinctive and widely reported policy.

Place Among China's Science Prizes

The Xplorer Prize stands as one of the highest-funded awards for young scientists in China, a description used consistently by universities and media reporting its results. Its distinctiveness within the Chinese prize landscape comes from the combination of four features: it is non-governmental, initiated by a technology founder and a group of the country's most eminent scientists; it is scientist-led in governance, with selection by a jury of hundreds and a management committee of working academicians; its funding per recipient, 3 million renminbi over five years with no strings attached, is large by the standards of individual prizes; and it covers the full breadth of basic science and frontier technology in ten fields, including, from 2022, clinical medical science. Peking University's tally of 53 scholars among the 397 winners by 2026 indicates the prize's penetration of the country's leading research institutions. As a philanthropic instrument created in 2018 and professionalised under the New Cornerstone Science Foundation from 2022, the prize also represents the entry of China's technology philanthropy into the long-term funding of basic research, a role historically played by the state.

Significance

The significance of the Xplorer Prize is best measured in careers rather than ceremonies. By August 2026 it had supported 397 outstanding young scientists, each with 3 million renminbi of flexible funding across five years, in fields from arithmetic dynamics and non-Abelian anyons to retinal photostimulation and planetary robots. Its founding coalition, a technology founder acting with Yang Chen-Ning, Rao Yi, Shi Yigong, Pan Jianwei, Shing-Tung Yau and their peers, gave private science philanthropy in China an authority that a purely corporate prize could not have commanded. Its policies, favouring the youngest applicants, extending eligibility to Hong Kong and Macao, adding medical sciences in 2022 and raising the age limit for women in 2024, show an institution adjusting its rules toward the researchers it judges most at risk of being lost to basic science. Filed as an organisation profile, the prize documents a structural change in how Chinese science is funded: alongside state grants, a scientist-led philanthropic endowment now sustains a visible share of the country's young research leadership, cohort by cohort, and its annual announcements have become a recognised barometer of where Chinese basic science is heading.